Disclosure

Today my son asked me if I was happy with my life and if I had any regrets.  I deflected a little.  "We all have regrets," I said, which is trite and true at the same time.  "Like what," he pressed, "name some things."  I was driving at the time and concentrating on turning onto a busy street so I managed to not answer and turned the conversation to another topic as soon as I swung into the traffic flow.

In made me think about how much of my past is proper to disclose to my children, even though they're all adults and married with their own families. Well, let's see.... I was growing up in the 60's and 70's so you know from jump street that there's a few things I might not be eager to share.  Add into the equation that I was going through a major phase of rebellion (long story - remind me to tell you about that sometime) and the end result is that there are plenty of regrets that I've compartmentalized and filed away from my youth.

The truth is, I think I squandered some of my youth by making a series of poor decisions.  Luckily, I've never had to live with any consequences of the dumb things I did aside from the profound sadness of knowing that those days are gone forever and there aren't any do-over options.  Some mornings when I look in the mirror and see silver hair and aging skin I find myself so wishing that I could jump in a time machine and erase the stupid things and re-write my life history.  But then, I suppose, things might not have unfolded for me the way they did.  I might not have married Mike or had the great kids we were blessed with, so that does assuage a lot of the regret that backs up into my soul some days like a clogged drain.

Even though these life secrets are destined to remain secrets, I still wonder if any of my friends have memories of things they did that make them cringe when they think of them.  Make them squirm.  Things they maybe never shared with their spouse.  Now don't go thinking I've done things that would make the evening news because my regrets are nothing like that.  They are just some things that embarrass me or make me feel ashamed even though hardly anyone knows about them.  I have trouble imagining any of my friends harboring real regrets like I do.  In my mind, their lives were generally blot free and the worst mistakes they made would be ones they could talk about now over drinks and laughingly shake their heads while saying "What was I thinking??"  Then everyone else at the table would try to one-up and share stories about one night stands or smoking up in their bedrooms while their parents were downstairs.

I may dole some sanitized tidbits out to my kids on an as-needed basis if it helps to make a point.  And I have made peace with God and myself for bad things I've said and done, but the one thing I can't change is that my twenties are long and irretrievably gone.  On the upside, despite the regrets that I still hold in that secret pocket of my heart, I am happy with my life.  So happy that if I had to repeat all those stupid choices and live with those regrets to still be blessed with all the goodness that I have, I would do it all again in a heart beat.  I guess as imperfect beings we may all be works in progress and I am certainly no exception.  My son confidently predicted that I would be around for another 30 years or so (sounds optimistic to me, but we'll see..,) and there's still a lot that I can do.  Looking back, I guess if my twenties are the only decade that I really have regrets over, it's been a good run and I expect more of the same in the decades to come - however many there are left.